A Look At The Ups & Downs Of Shinsuke Nakamura’s WWE Career Heading Into WrestleMania 34

Royal Rumble

Shinsuke gained back steam when he won the Royal Rumble earlier this year. With his win, he accomplished two very important things:

1. He essentially guaranteed Shinsuke vs. AJ Styles at WrestleMania
2. He eliminated the company golden boy, Roman Reigns

Both of these factors indicate that WWE has faith in Nakamura to be in a world title match at the biggest event of the year (albeit the “less important one”). WWE, though, saw the opportunity for a money “dream” match and took it.

Since Royal Rumble, Shinsuke also has been decently entertaining and has cut some okay promos. Considering his main angle for a month was, “I’m going to beat you at WrestleMania,” it did not look good at first. However, in the past few weeks he’s been letting his mannerisms take over to help him get his points across, which is much more his cup of tea. Things like patting AJ on the head are gold, and Shinsuke is showing signs of growing as a character by playing some mind games with the WWE champion ahead of their big match.

WrestleMania & Beyond

I do not believe we have seen the best Nakamura has to offer yet. Sure, maybe WWE Nakamura only spin kicks and hits exploder suplexes, but he also is starting to get his bearings as a real character instead of just being a flashy entrance and a catchy theme song (lookout Bobby Roode). He may also open the floodgates to some additional moves at WrestleMania, where he can wrestle a more open match against someone who knows how to work with him: AJ Styles.

Whether Shinsuke wins or loses at WrestleMania, there is still some identity work to be done. Casual and hardcore fans alike have to know exactly who Shinsuke Nakamura is and why he’s so good. The experience of being in a big time WrestleMania match may just be the career jumpstart that Nakamura needs. After WrestleMania is where things need to start moving from Shinsuke Nakamura. 2017 showed some growing pains, but 2018 needs to show what it already has for Nakamura- progress.